The story of the first new CWGC cemetery constructed in half a century

In May 2008, after several years of painstaking research and investigation,
a number of mass graves dating from the First World War were identified at
Pheasant Wood, near Fromelles in northern France. They contained the
remains of Australian and British servicemen who died in the Battle of
Fromelles that took place between 19 and 20 July 1916.

For reasons of hygiene and decency, the men had been buried by the Germans soon
after the battle. There they remained, undiscovered, for nearly a century until
an Australian historian convinced military authorities that they were there.

The British and Australian Governments asked the Commonwealth War Graves Commission
to oversee the operation to recover the remains and rebury them. Although remains
of soldiers still come to light from the Great War at a rate of some 30 a year,
the discovery of 250 bodies at one site was exceptional. It led to the decision
that for the first time since the 1960s a new cemetery would have to be
constructed by the Commission.

Remembering Fromelles charts the story of the discovery of the mass graves,
the archaeology behind the excavations, the question of identification and
the process of reburial and cemetery construction undertaken during the course
of 2009 and 2010.